After the cross country advance of the National Protection Army, Jingdaoese panzers crossed from the Phelixian Theme into the Theme of Vey, the most densely populated part of the country defended by the largest of the Home Guard armies, the 700,000 strong Army of Vey.
A day after the Jingdaoese air raids on Vey targeting civilian food distribution centres, the Army of Vey began to move into its forward positions to meet the advancing Jingdaoese Panzers.
The 4th Home Guard Army was assigned the task of securing the strategic town of Arbington which sat astride the road eastwards to Ad Pontes and would open up the interior of the Theme of Vey to the invaders.
On the left flank of the 4th HG Army was the 5th Home Guard Army whilst on the right was the 8th. The 7th HG Army was assigned to the right flank of the 8th with the intention of keeping the lines of communications open with the River Army which was regrouping at Elaion after the Battle of Ridge 71. The 6th HG Army meanwhile was held in reserve at Vey, whilst the Basileusean Army moved into the city to take over garrison duties.
The main striking force of the 4th HG Army was the 3rd HG Corps, comprised of five infantry divisions, into which had been funnelled most of the equipment and war material donated by the ESB Group, it was also reinforced with an Independent Armoured Brigade formed around one hundred land cruisers, Constancian cross-country exploration vehicles, modified by Marcellus Paixhans and the ESB into heavily armed infantry support tanks, supported by a fleet of around 1,900 commandeered SUVs and gun trucks providing force mobility and a consignment of 120 improvised rocket launchers to provide indirect fire support.
Each Division of the 3rd Corps had an ESB supervised anti-tank regiment assigned and as the corps cut through to the town of Arbington, forcing refugees and deserters off the roads lest they be crushed under the tracks of the speeding land cruisers, these regiments peeled off from their parent divisions and began to commandeer the residential and commercial buildings that would form their defensive strong points.
The infantry divisions themselves, the 79th, 112th, 127th, 128th and the 132nd, pushed beyond the town into the orchards and plantations of the surrounding countryside, entrenching and setting up firing positions dispersed amongst the hedgerows and ditches that marked the divide between the reclaimed lands of the Theme and the desert wilderness beyond, that extended all the way south and east to the borders of the Kingdom itself. Each Division's Heavy Weapons Tagma took pains to situate their concealed machine gun nests in such a way as to ensure interlocking fields of fire, whilst the fire teams of the Rifle Tagmas settled into their individual foxholes and sent out section strength patrols to reconnoitre the lie of the land and to liberally scatter IEDs amongst the farm roads and herders tracks of the countryside.
Each divisional headquarters held in reserve the 6 mortar batteries assigned to their command, and had teams of civilians and deserters rounded up to dig mortar pits and entrenchments in the town itself. Women, children and the elderly, once they had contributed what they could to this labour, were dismissed and told to walk overland towards Northwich. As for the remaining men, after one in ten of the deserters were shot as an example to the others, the remainder were formed into auxiliary fire-fighting detachments, issued with gas masks, shovels and water buckets and told to be ready to assist the 3rd Corp's engineers in whatever tasks they might require.
Arbington then represented a commanding salient, held by the 3rd Corps whilst the remaining corps of the 4th Army, from east to west, the 5th, the 6th and the 7th HG Corps, fanned out to deploy a line of pickets extending along the front, connecting the salient with the armies to the east and west.